Unnatural Selection
by feveredfrenzy
Summary: AU from pilot. Ryan Atwood isn't who his file says he is and his meeting Sandy in juvie was no accident. It was all part of a plan, just like Sandy taking him home and the Cohens taking him in. The part where he found himself falling for all the Cohens' talk of family and finally feeling like part of one though...that...was unexpected.


A/N: So this is technically a crossover between The OC and The 4400, but I'm posting it just in The OC instead of as a crossover because it's definitely more of one show than the other. I think of it as an alternate universe OC story that borrows elements from The 4400 I've adapted to work here. I'm not following any of The 4400 storylines or even most of their mythology (for those who are familiar with it, I'm not using any of the time travel, the abductions/return, etc, I'm mostly just borrowing and adapting their mechanism for people having powers). I don't think you need any knowledge of that show to read and understand this story, I'm just making sure The 4400 gets credit for the ideas here that originated there. I do have some 4400 characters in this, but the focus is on The OC's characters and I use them wherever possible, filling in with others where necessary for the plot. Each 4400 character will be introduced with the assumption that readers aren't going to be already familiar with them. If you're a 4400 novice who gives this fic a try (and I hope you will, I'm nervous there's not enough people left in either of these fandoms, lol) - anyway, if you see a name you don't recognize referenced, it just means that you will be meeting that character eventually and will learn more about them then.

At the end of the day though, this is very much a story about Ryan Atwood and the connections he forms with the Cohens and various other OC characters. He's a bit more initially jaded (and swears a lot more) here than in canon, due to his different backstory, but hopefully I'll stay true enough to his character for fans of his to enjoy.

This starts out where the pilot did, just with a very different background unfolding for Ryan. Some of the dialogue in this first chapter is lifted from the pilot or altered slightly to fit this new AU. Again, just credit where credit's due! It's not set at any moment from the 4400, as again, there's no tie-in to the storylines there, just character and world-building elements.

* * *

Everything about this plan was terrible, Ryan decided as he waited for his public defender to arrive.

Decided maybe wasn't the right word. It wasn't like this was a new conclusion on his part. He'd been pretty firm in his opinion from the moment Maia proposed this convoluted mess of a clusterfuck. He'd just been outvoted. And since it was his ass sitting in a freezing, dimly lit room that stank of mildew, sweat, and the misery of the half a dozen other juvenile offenders conversing with their own lawyers - well. He'd continue to bitch about it as much as he damn well pleased, thank you very much.

 _Even if your bitching is giving me a headache?_ Gary fired the thought at him, the mental sending somehow tinged with a distinctly sour mood.

 _Sitting in this chair is probably giving me hepatitis_ , Ryan thought back. _We all have to make sacrifices, remember?_

Sides, its not like he'd asked the telepath to tag along in his head and keep watch. He'd been outvoted on that too. He really needed better friends.

 _Headsup, three o'clock_ , was all Gary thought in reply.

 _No shit. I know what the dude looks like._ He rolled his eyes and quickly ducked his head before Sandy Cohen decided that had been directed at him. He didn't need the time it took his lawyer to navigate the room to size him up and prepare. They'd pretty much been stalking the guy for the past month as they prepared for this.

"Ryan? Sandy Cohen. The court's appointed me as your public defender," his lawyer said as he reached the table designated for them. "You okay? They treating you alright in here?"

He grunted and his lawyer took that as an invitation to sit down.

"Where's Arturo?"

Ryan blurted it out on instinct once the man had settled into his seat across from him, spreading his papers across the table's surface. He could feel Gary sighing in his head and he squirmed. It wasn't the opener Maia had carefully scripted for him. Fuck. Two seconds in and he was already screwing this up. He'd told everyone he was the worst choice possible for this. Why did no one ever listen to him?

"That's not who you need to be worrying about right now. Your friend is over 18. Arturo stole a car. Arturo had a gun in his pants, an ounce of pot in his pocket, a couple of priors. I'm guessing right now, Arturo's looking at three to five years. And Arturo's not my concern," Sandy Cohen said, continuing to look over his file without seeming to care much about the callous dismissal spilling out of his mouth in response to Ryan's question.

Ryan's nails dug into his palms, and he carefully kept his mouth shut. This was stupid, he really shouldn't be bothered by this guy's opinion of Turo given that like…all the information he was basing it on was literally made up two weeks before they set this in motion. It was pretty much the point of the history they'd crafted for Arturo, to make Ryan look better in comparison, provide a direct contrast so Cohen was more likely to view him as just being led astray by bad influences. Be more sympathetic.

Seriously. He was being an idiot. This was the plan right?

"This is your first time in lockup," Mr. Cohen continued, oblivious to the thoughts running through Ryan's head. To be fair, most people didn't have a telepath riding shotgun during a meeting. But Ryan was finding himself less and less inclined to be fair the more the lawyer talked. "I'm assuming you don't plan on coming back. Your grades…are not great. Suspended twice for fighting, truancy three times…huh. Your test scores, 98 percentile on your SAT I? Ryan, 98 percentile, if you start going to class, are you thinking about college?"

He snorted to himself at the way his defender's voice shifted into an entirely different gear the second he saw his test scores. The lawyer had managed to fake a couple moments of seeming concern when he first approached, but the stark comparison between that and his obvious engagement now that he'd found something he liked in those few sheets of paper he spent more time looking at than Ryan's face…nice. Okay, now that he was 'smart', he was worth some actual effort, unlike all those other losers in here huh? Good thing they put that little hook in his own carefully crafted history instead of going with some 'average' test scores. Special circumstances for special kids only, right? Sucks to be everyone else.

 _Ryan, you gotta cool it_ , Gary hissed into his brain, the sending somehow feeling nervous.

"Have you given any thought at all to your future? Dude. I'm on your side. Come on, help me out here."

 _Do not say what you're about to say_ , his friend warned before Ryan had the chance to do more than open his mouth. _Maia gave you an answer for this, remember? This is nothing you didn't prepare for. You can't let this shit get under your skin._

 _Easier said than done_ , Ryan thought. It was different in the heat of the moment. With Mr. Cohen sitting across from him, watching him, judging him. This wasn't going at all like he'd thought it would when he agreed to this plan, even as unenthusiastically as he had. Story of his life. Even with impossibly low expectations, the bar always found a way to drop lower.

But he took a breath, chewed the inside of his lip, let the silence linger until it was like…weighty. A pregnant pause. This was the plan, he reminded himself. It was supposed to go this way. No point fucking it up at this stage just cause he couldn't handle a little…stage fright or whatever was going on with him.

 _It's called performance anxiety,_ Gary helpfully supplied.

 _You're an asshole,_ he glowered.

The little mental jab found his voice for him though, and he looked up from his hands, directing a little smirk at the man across from him.

"Modern medicine is advancing to the point where the average human life span will be 100. But I read this article which said Social Security is supposed to run out by the year 2025, which means people are going to have to stay at their jobs until they're 80. So I don't want to commit to anything too soon."

He almost choked getting out the carefully rehearsed line, heaving a sigh at the memory of how freaking proud of themselves Maia and Theresa had been for that one. Maybe it would play differently coming out of someone else's mouth, but hearing it out of his own, Ryan couldn't focus on anything but how painfully phony he sounded. Like he was ever going to be someone who went to college, who held a job that actually gave social security benefits…like things like diplomas or benefits would ever be worth anything when made out to the fake name his brother had made up for him when they ran away. Idly he wondered if he'd even recognize his real name anymore if someone were to ever actually call him by it. Didn't matter, he supposed. He was Ryan Atwood now, had been for years. That other boy was long dead and gone, whoever he'd been.

Even further back in the recesses of his mind, there was a tiny voice saying forget living to eighty or one hundred, he'd be glad if he made it all the way to seventeen.

But he ignored that voice.

He was trying to cut back on the cynicism these days.

Forcing his attention back to the present, he couldn't decide if he was more annoyed at himself for managing to recite his little monologue with a straight face, or at his lawyer for how eagerly he ate it up.

Sandy Cohen chuckled, entertained. Like the chimp in the zoo had just performed an amusing little trick. "Look, I can plead this down to a misdemeanor. Petty fine, probation. But know this - stealing a car 'cause your friend dared you to, it's stupid, and it's weak, and those are two things you can't afford to be anymore."

Nope. No contest. Definitely more annoyed at his lawyer.

Ryan set his jaw and stared down at his cuffed hands. He couldn't tell if the guy was just running his mouth or if he was testing him, trying to see what kind of reaction he got with that. His tone felt more like the former than the latter, but Ryan couldn't think of a time in his life where someone had called him weak and not meant it as a test. So as much as he tried to clamp down on his kneejerk response and temper his reply, he couldn't totally filter the challenge out of his voice.

"What makes you think that's why we stole it? You weren't there."

The older man hesitated, his brow furrowed slightly. He shook his head as though to clear it. It was like Ryan could actually see him steel himself for another attempt to get through to him.

"Look, I get it. We're cut from the same deck, Ryan. I grew up no money, bad part of the Bronx. My father was gone, my mother worked all the time. I was pissed off. I was stupid. But eventually I learned, you just have to get over the fact that life dealt you a bad hand. And now you gotta learn that too, or things are never gonna get any better for you, kid."

The snark slipped out before he could even think about holding it back.

"Wow, you got all that from that one little file there huh? They must have used a pretty small font to fit my whole life story in something that size."

Ryan fought to keep his lips from twisting into a jagged smirk that wasn't going to do a hell of a lot to endear him to this douchebag who didn't have the first fucking clue what his life was like - neither his real life nor even the fake one typed up on that paper.

This was the guy whose charity Maia was banking their whole plan on? The asshole reeked of self righteousness. Okay, so your friend daring you to steal a car was a more probable guess than you stealing a car just to land yourself in lockup and get me appointed your public defender in order to forge an initial connection. Fair enough. But he'd grown up around enough 'juvenile delinquents' to know there were a hell of a lot of reasons in between those two extremes that explained the choices that had landed them in here. He couldn't help but wonder how many of his other clients Saint Sandy had pegged as miniature versions of himself just wasting away, making stupid mistakes to kill time until he could come along and try to ram them into a cookie cutter knock-off of his own life's course. What happened to innocent until proven guilty, Ryan sneered to himself. Wasn't your defender supposed to like…take five seconds to ask you what happened and why, just in case there was a chance the explanation someone had tossed into that little file wasn't actually the right one?

This was a terrible fucking plan, Ryan decided again. This jackass was no different from any of the hundreds of other adults throughout his life who'd judged, condemned and dismissed him with nothing more than a glance. And the others really thought they could steer this encounter into Mr. Cohen and his Presumably Perfect and Upstanding Family opening their house to him and taking him in? They were all fucked. This was officially the worst plan they'd ever come up with, and they'd come up with some doozies before.

 _Ryan, chill,_ Gary cautioned, a hint of panic in his telepathic voice. _You need to dial it back, man. You can't afford to alienate him, we're not gonna get another chance at this if you fuck it up here._

"Look," Mr. Cohen tried again. Probably for the last time. "Smart kid like you. You got to have a plan. Some kind of a dream."

 _Maia says you can still salvage this,_ Gary sent quickly, cutting off the tirade trying to climb its way up Ryan's throat. He bit down on his lip, hard. Trained his eyes on his lap, breathed through his nose while Gary continued. _He's jaded but looking for a reason not to be. He wants to like you, wants you to be different from other clients he couldn't keep from ending up worse, you just need to give him a reason to think you're not just another punk who's already given up on life._

The boiling pit of resentment churning in his belly only ignited further. Magma that spread through his veins, putting pressure on the surface, threatening to crack through the mantle and bubble forth. _Fuck you, Gary._

There was the mental equivalent of the older teenager holding up his hands defensively then. _Hey, his thoughts, man, not mine. Look, I get it. I'm not exactly a fan either, but we need this to work. We've already put too much into this plan and the only reason we went with a fucking Hail Mary like this in the first place is nothing else Maia and Theresa came up with had even a chance of working. So suck it up and make it work. Take a breath. Play the pity card. Make him feel sorry for you and get drunk and bitch about it later. But do it the fuck now, before we lose him._

Ryan breathed deep. Sucked it up. Played the pity card.

"Yeah, right. Let me tell you something, okay? Where I'm from, having a dream doesn't make you smart. Knowing it won't come true…that does."

As much as the words grated in his ears like nails on a chalkboard, at least these ones were true.

* * *

His lawyer didn't have much to say after that, which was something at least, Ryan supposed. The rest of the meeting breezed by much more easily. Time dragged as he waited for the older man to file the appropriate paperwork, make the appropriate calls, talk to the appropriate people, but whatever. It was prison, not Disneyland. Wasn't that surprising. Eventually he was given back his clothes, uncuffed and taken to change before he was shoved out the front door behind his lawyer in the closest approximation to efficiency he'd encountered since he'd stepped foot in the damn place.

"My office will contact you to remind you of the date for your hearing," Sandy Cohen buzzed in his ear as they stood outside in the late afternoon heat. Ryan nodded absently, his focus elsewhere.

"I'll remember."

It didn't take much searching to find Maia and Gary. They were settled just across the street, a little ways down the block, seated on a bench as though waiting for the bus. Slouched on the bench while scribbling in one of her journals, wearing pigtails to accompany her jeans and a T-shirt advertising some pop group he'd never heard of but could guarantee he hated, Maia looked like an actual thirteen year old girl for once. As opposed to like, the creepy little fortune cookie she really was. Gary sat next to her, the tall black boy slouched so much further in his seat that his head was almost level with hers. His feet stretched out across the sidewalk into the gutter, carefully advertising how much he didn't give a fuck, don't sit next to him, stay away. He caught Ryan's gaze and grinned, lifting a couple fingers in a casual salute.

 _Homestretch_ , Gary sent to him. _Almost done with this, now sell this scene like a motherfucker._

Ryan cast a sideways glance at his lawyer to make sure he hadn't noticed, but the man's eyes were trained on his watch.

 _Aaaaaand three…two…one…_ Gary counted down before bursting into a sing song melody that made him really really want to punch the older boy. He was enjoying this way too much. _Here comes the sun, deet un dee do…_

Sun. Dawn. Got it. Hilarious, Gary. Real comedic talent you got there.

Right on cue, there was the screen of tires and the acrid tang of burnt rubber, as a beat up old sedan that looked like it'd just come straight from the junkyard barreled around the corner and headed towards them so fast and unapologetically Ryan almost took a step back in shock, even with the advantage of forewarning. Sandy Cohen had none of that and almost jumped backwards. Somehow his hand caught Ryan's wrist in his grip and dragged him back a pace or two with him. Ryan glanced down at the grip, bemused, before Mr. Cohen released it.

He cleared his head and turned back to the car. Which, he noticed, had settled to a stop with its front wheel perched precariously on the sidewalk itself.

 _Seriously? Jumping the curb? None of this is striking the rest of you as overkill?_

That was before the driver's side door slammed open and shut again, and a woman whose wardrobe could only be described as wishing it was good enough to take to a flea market rounded the car, ranting and waving her arms. Her blond straggly hair was a chaotic frenzy of disarray and neglect. Her makeup was packed into the wrinkles on her face, emphasizing its weathered texture. Her voice was the melodic screeching of crows engaged in a battle to the death with alley cats, victory to be determined by which could be more shrill. Ryan stared.

 _You said something about overkill?_ Gary snickered into his brain. Ryan was pretty sure Maia was giggling on the other side of the street there. Which was freaky as shit. Maia didn't do humor. Like, ever.

 _I hate you all_ , he sighed, even as his lips twitched himself. At least until he cast another sideways glance at his lawyer and noticed the poorly disguised look of horror plastered across his face as he took in the sight of Ryan's 'mother'.

That sobered him right the hell up. Oh yeah. This was meant to come across as disturbing. The fact that this was pretty much the first thing he could ever remember him, Gary and Maia mutually viewing as funny, well…that probably said a great deal about just how twisted and fucked up all of them actually were.

Ugh, being self aware sucked balls.

"Unbelievable! What kind of family I got, huh? What the hell did I do to deserve this family? You want to tell me that?"

By the time Sandy Cohen managed to tear his eyes away from the woman marching up to them with all the grace of…a drunken manatee stranded on land, the swift and sudden downturn Ryan's thoughts had taken him had him quiet and contemplative enough that he probably appeared stricken. Humiliated. Ashamed? All the things he was supposed to be in the face of a mother like this? He wasn't really sure. Despite the fact that 'Dawn Atwood' had literally been modeled after his own memories of his real mother, it had been a long time since he'd seen her. It was hard to match the memories up with the emotions.

"Mrs. Atwood? I'm Sandy Cohen. I'm Ryan's attorney."

"You should've let him rot in there. Just like his dad. I can't deal with this shit. Let's go Ryan. Now, Ryan!"

He hesitated as she angrily strode back to the car. Watched the lawyer as he looked back and forth between Ryan and her, slowly. His jaw working as though he was trying to say something but he wasn't actually sure what that something was. Funny. He hadn't struck Ryan as someone who was at a loss for words much.

Ryan held his breath.

"I'm going to give you my card," Sandy Cohen quietly said at last, pulling it out of his pocket and handing it to him. "My home number. If you need somebody, if things get to be too much, call me."

He took the offered card and nodded, a little numb. It was weird. He wasn't entirely sure what he was feeling, and Gary was suspiciously silent in his head. They'd…they'd mapped out several possible directions this might take, and this…it wasn't a bad one honestly. Sandy Cohen had given him his card, told him to call him. That was all they needed for this to work. Maia had said from her first vision of this plan, that was the important part. As long as he got the card…the plan would work. It would all be fine.

He had the card. The number. They had the ending they needed from all this.

He just…he had the unsettling feeling that it wasn't the ending he'd wanted. Which was weird right? 'Cause until five seconds ago, he was pretty sure he didn't want anything from any of this, didn't want any of it at all.

"Let's go!" His 'mother' hollered from behind the window.

"All right!" Ryan yelled back, strong-arming his feet into making actual movements. He jerked the passenger side front door open, struggling a little with it in its rusted frame. Slouched into the seat. Looked back over his shoulder at the lawyer as Dawn revved the engine and shoved at the clutch, the car bouncing on its shocks as she maneuvered it back onto the street.

The lawyer was watching him too. A weird, pinched expression on his face. Ryan couldn't really think how else to describe it.

Weird.

He focused enough to nod at Gary and Maia as the piece of crap passing for a car lumbered past their bench. They'd meet them back at the house. Gary had a curiously shuttered look on his own face. Maia was frowning. Only Dawn seemed unphased by the unsettling mood that lay like a shroud over the entire past two minutes. They made it about two blocks before she laughed and pounded the steering wheel with a fist.

"Ha!" She crowed. "Gimme my Oscar, bitches, told you I could rock that. C'mon, was that a performance or what?"

"Oh yeah." Ryan rolled his eyes, fighting with the window until it relented and rolled down enough to allow some fresh air into the car, something to compete with the stench of alcohol soaked into the very fabric of her shirt, as far as he could tell. "Stunning. Riveting. Flawless."

"Better than you, asshole," she frowned, mood shifting from glee to grimaces with a speed he'd only seen matched by the inspiration for her role, a whole lifetime ago. "Wasn't the plan for you to make him stop you from getting in the car at all? Just take you home with him there and then?"

"That was Plan A," he said softly, training his gaze on the scenery whizzing by. As compelling a vista as block after block of rundown tenement buildings was. "We went with Plan B instead. Besides, I couldn't make him do anything. That's the whole point. None of this will work if they don't actually want me there. Don't trust me. If they don't trust me, there's no chance of getting anyone else to either."

"Whatever." She grunted and jerked the wheel, steering them off the road and down a side alley behind some warehouses. "You're killing my buzz. I don't want to sit in a fucking car with you for ten minutes if you're just gonna be a depressing little bitch the whole time."

"Wait, what?" His mood had dulled his reaction times. They were already parked by the time he shifted to face her. Not that there was anything he could to stop her from falling to pieces in front of his eyes. "Goddammit, how am I supposed to get home?"

The cracks barely hidden under her skin grew as she rolled her eyes at him. "You have two legs. It's only like four miles. Aren't you supposed to be a fucking math genius?"

With a shudder, her body collapsed into itself, skin and hair and nails and teeth all losing color and texture and ending up as a giant mound of dirt and sand and scattered leaves that cascaded down the front seat and piled onto the floor, almost filling the entire driver's side of the car. Her empty clothes fluttered limply to a rest on top of it all. He ground his teeth in aggravation and pounded his arm against the dashboard in a show of impotent fury that would embarrass him if he weren't so beyond giving a fuck about anything at this point.

He glanced again at the miniature beach the front of the car had turned into, the pedals buried uselessly under several feet of sand and dirt and debris. The keys were still in the ignition. Wherever the hell she'd picked up this trash heap from, at least she hadn't hot-wired it. But it would still take him forever to shovel all the sand out of the front seat so he could work the pedals. He shoved open his door. Fuck it. He'd walk.

The mad scientists at Haspel Corp had cooked up a lot of weird shit in their labs, when they'd snatched them all up off the streets years ago and turned a bunch of unnoticed, unwanted homeless kids nobody gave a fuck about into superpowered freaks they could exploit for profit. For every telepath like Gary and precog like Maia, there was someone else with a power that could only be described as freaking bizarre. But out of all of them, Heather's still took the cake as far as he was concerned.

According to the eggheads who'd poked and prodded at her, jabbering on excitedly as they ran their tests, it was somehow telekinetic in nature, but only in one very specific way. She couldn't bend spoons with her mind, couldn't open a door or lift a glass. But what Heather could do, was gather up particulate matter, little stray bits of dust and dirt and sand and other shit and mash it all together, sculpt it into any kind of person or creature she could imagine…and then she made it real. Oh, it was still just a lump of inanimate matter poured into a new shape by her mind…it wasn't like she actually made flesh and bone out of debris and rubble. She just made it look like she did, her subconscious somehow knowing how to shift molecules around to give the surface the right colors and textures to look like skin or fur or scales. And then, as though that weren't enough, her power also let her animate her creation. Her mind could slip inside it and wear it like a skin she could walk around in, talk in, drive a car with or do anything she could do with her real body, even as her real body rested in a trance wherever she'd left it when taking her new skin out for a test drive.

It was definitely one of the weirder powers Ryan had ever come across, if not the actual top of the list. But he couldn't deny that it was also pretty freaking cool. Which made it all the more annoying that Heather only ever used it in pursuit of being a total fucking bitch.

That was the real problem, he reflected as he shoved his hands in his pockets and started off in the direction of the house. Like, bad enough being snatched out of a shelter when he was eleven and shoved into the back of a van, carted off to be turned into a lab rat for some greedy-ass corporation's shiny new superpower drug, (that luckily only killed half the people it was used on instead of giving them shiny new superpowers). But why did so many of the fellow science fair exhibits -the only people who would ever truly understand his fucked up life - have to be such total assholes?

Okay, so it probably had a lot to do with them all only being convenient candidates for mad scientist experiments because they were all homeless and on their own for various reasons that could be pretty quickly summed up as Abused, Neglected and Otherwise Traumatized.

But still. It was just obnoxious sometimes. Just…try not to be total dicks like, all the time, guys. Take a day off now and then. It's all he was asking for. Really low standards here, remember?

* * *

The sun was setting by the time Ryan made it back to the decrepit little house they'd been squatting in as they laid the foundations for their grand master plan. He trudged up the weed-flanked walkway, his shadow stretching all the way back across the street. He lingered at the door for several long drawn out moments before finally pushing it open.

Maia and Gary had beaten him back there. The former sitting cross legged on the floor, scrawling in her journal while the latter perched on a bar stool at the kitchen counter, greeting him with a nod. Nobody seemed that surprised to see him, so obviously they'd all already gotten the details on his failure to get Sandy Cohen, Champion of the Downtrodden, to keep him from getting in the fucking car with 'Dawn'. Whatever. That part was always a longshot anyway, so he didn't want to hear any shit from anybody about it. He'd at least gotten the business card from the man, and Maia had spent all last week explaining all the contingencies to them; getting the card was the real key moment in all the possible futures where this thing actually worked. As long as he had the card and its phone number, he was still in the game.

Heather was sprawled on the threadbare couch with her asshole boyfriend Volchok, the two of them lazily passing a joint back and forth between them. Eddie was seated on the other barstool, nursing a beer and fidgeting with a deck of playing cards as usual. And Shawn was leaning against the far wall, arms crossed his chest and clearly waiting for him to get home. Looking for all the world like the de facto father figure he really was to their merry band of freaks, despite the fact that he was barely eighteen himself.

"Heather's been awake for over an hour. What took you so long? You stop at a Starbucks or something?"

Less than three years older than Ryan himself, but damn if Shawn didn't have that whole paternal disapproval shtick down cold. Ryan rubbed at his temples and sought refuge in a fresh cigarette. He so wasn't in the mood for this. Who died and put Shawn in charge anyway? Oh right. They'd voted on that too.

Fuck democracy.

"If you wanted me back here sooner, you should have told Heather not to dump me four miles away," was all he said. He was too tired to work an appropriately smart-assed remark in there somewhere. Crafting a good one took actual effort.

He did have to admit that in Shawn's defense, as irritating as his dad routine could be, he tried to be fair and balanced when being a condescending prick. That was all it took to shift his gaze and annoyance to Heather on the couch.

"What the fuck, Heather," Shawn questioned coolly. She giggled and took another hit, flapping her hand in the air. Oscar my ass, Ryan thought to himself. The role of Dawn Atwood didn't exactly require her to dig that deep.

Gary snickered.

He'd be annoyed the older teen was still eavesdropping in his head, but mutual disdain for Heather and Volchok trumped invasion of privacy. It was all about priorities.

"It was an accident," Heather said after she made it through a fit of coughing and another bout of giggles. "You know it's hard for me to control my mannequins from that far away. I just lost the connection is all. It happens."

"Bitch," Ryan muttered. He rolled his eyes as he was forced to navigate between the couch and the coffee table to make it to the empty armchair that was the only seat left. Volchok tilted his head towards him and screwed up his face in what was probably supposed to be a dangerous smirk, wagging a finger at him in warning. A fireball ignited at the tip of it; the pyrokinetic version of overcompensating for a tiny dick, if you asked Ryan.

Gary snickered again.

There were still too many assholes in the room though, not enough allies.

"So when are you springing Arturo from the joint?" He asked, puffing on his own cigarette and adding to the dull haze blanketing the room.

"We're going to wait a couple days," Shawn said. "Gotta give it some time, just in case Cohen calls or checks in on him as part of your case, verify some details or whatever. Once we're sure he won't be following up any further, Tess and Marco will bust him out and make it so he was never there."

Ryan snorted. "If that's all you're worried about, you might as well go get him tonight. The chances of Sandy Cohen putting more than the barest of minimums into my case are in the negative integers. No point in risking anything happening to Turo on that account."

"You're wrong about Mr. Cohen," Maia piped up from the floor. Or whatever the emotionless equivalent of piping up was called. She'd be a hell of a lot less creepy if she ever bothered to put some inflection in her voice, and coming from him that was saying a lot. "And nothing bad is going to happen to Turo. I would have said something if I saw anything."

He took a long drag off his cigarette and blew it towards her. Staring at her pointedly when she raised her head from that damn book to glare at him.

"Well since it's not like you're ever wrong, do you see Cohen checking on him and giving a reason we have to make him stay in there any longer?"

Shawn jumped in before it could get ugly. Uglier. Whatever. Ryan was aware he was in a mood and taking it out on everyone, but everyone else was in a mood and taking it out on him and…ugh. Fuck it. He just wanted all this to be over with already, and it had barely even started. That wasn't promising. At all.

"Look, we're just trying to cover all our bases to be safe. Arturo volunteered for this part of the plan and we're not just leaving him in there to fend for himself. Gary's headed over in a little while, he's gonna stay close enough to keep an eye on things just in case. At the first hint of trouble, we'll have Marco pop Arturo out of there and have Tess do damage control if need be. Okay?"

"Seriously, just chill," Eddie said. "Turo can handle himself just fine. It's not like we all haven't spent a lot more time in a lot worse cages than Chino Penitentiary. Why don't we focus on an actual problem instead? Like why Ryan gets to be the one to chill in a fucking mansion for the next few months. I still say that with my luck power, I could pull this off a hell of a lot easier."

Volchok cracked up. The lit end of his joint zigzagged through the air like the red dot of a laser pointer. "Oh for sure. I can totally see you and the Stephens brat as besties in no time. No way for that to go wrong."

"I bet the senator would just be begging his kid to invite his good friend Eddie to spend more time at their place," Heather chimed in, giggling again.

"We've been through this," Shawn said. Ryan could practically hear his teeth grinding from across the room. "We all tried out Theresa and Maia's simulation thing and for whatever reason, it worked better with Ryan every time. He's our best shot at making this work, and his power gives him the easiest access to things once he's in with the Cohens and settled at Harbor. So I don't care if anyone else has a problem with this. This is the plan. We all agreed. We're doing it, so everybody just shut the fuck up and deal with it. This isn't about anyone living the high life. Eddie, if you want some Egyptian cotton sheets that bad, go buy a lottery ticket and hope your luck keeps it from getting you back on Ryland's radar."

The other really obnoxious thing about Shawn was when he got pissed off enough to play the 'I am your sorta kinda father and you will do as I say' card, it actually worked. Half the people in this room could kill him with their brains, but twenty seconds of sternly radiating disapproval with a slightly raised voice, and he had everyone tucking their metaphorical tails between their legs and settling the fuck down. He wondered if maybe Shawn actually had two superpowers, or was that just a dad thing that all sorta father figures could do? He couldn't picture like, Sandy Cohen pulling off the paternal disappointment shtick half as well as Shawn, despite being twice Shawn's age. But then again, for all his talk of growing up poor in the Bronx, Sandy Cohen probably didn't have anywhere close to the life experience Shawn had. Or that any of them had for that matter.

Whatever. Why the hell was he wondering about Sandy Cohen's paternal mannerisms? Random. Ryan tried to remember when the last time he ate was. Most of his moments of total randomness could be chalked up to really poor eating habits. Like literally. The kind where you ate once a day because Volchok and Eddie were greedy fucking pigs and the next time they ate half the groceries without leaving anything for anyone else, Ryan was going to stab them in their sleep.

Yeah. Definitely a low blood sugar thing.

"Ryan needs to make the call now," Maia said. He lifted his head, bleary-eyed from the cigarette and the kind of exhaustion that goes hand in hand with anticipating something you really don't want to do. Everyone's head swiveled to face him, lending her words the weight of a funeral dirge. Nobody questioned her though. When Maia spoke in that tone, she wasn't speaking, she was like. Proclaiming. There was no margin of error, no room for negotiation once that tone came into play. Not all of Maia's visions came true. Just the ones that made her speak in that tone.

Shit. This was really happening.

Shawn nodded. A sharp, decisive motion that usually acted as a kick in the ass to get everyone moving. Ryan really didn't want to move.

"Alright then. Ryan, you heard her. It's all you from here. Everyone needs to keep their distance just in case. If Senator Stephens is in bed with Ryland, there could be others in Newport involved with the Haspel Corporation as well. We need to minimize risk of exposure as much as possible. We're not going to be able to back you up or smooth anything over. Stick to Maia's script as much as you can, but if it goes off the tracks, you gotta improvise. Theresa will dreamwalk you every night to check in."

"A little late to be assuming I don't know the drill," Ryan said dryly. "Into the lion's den. All by my lonesome. Got it."

He waved his hand through the fog of smoke gathered around his head like his own personal stormcloud of doom. It didn't escape his notice that said cloud of smoke was literally of his own making, which made this a really shitty metaphor to choose to read into. "Like everyone's so fond of pointing out lately, it's not like I didn't know what I was getting into with this."

"You shouldn't smoke," Maia said. "It'll make things harder when you're there."

He eyed his cigarette. Eyed her. Shook his head. "If you honestly think I'm doing this without some fucking nicotine in me, your visions are more of a joke than Miss Cleo."

She frowned, but he was already lurching to his feet, snatching up his backpack from behind the couch where it lay ready, holding another pair of jeans, a couple of wifebeaters, two t-shirts, three pairs of socks, a Heinlein paperback and less changes of underwear than he wanted to admit. Aka all his worldly possessions. Gary was eyeing him sympathetically from the counter, and even Heather and Volchok were oddly quiet, which was just freaky as all hell. The last thing he needed right now was Little Miss Prophecy Girl opening her mouth and issuing another proclamation of doom.

"Hey Ry! Think fast!"

He turned towards Eddie just in time to catch a punch to his left cheek. He wasn't normally a pushover, but between the whole blood sugar thing and being totally offguard, it almost knocked him on his ass.

"Goddammit Eddie!" Shawn bellowed.

"What? Maia said it was a good idea!" Eddie backed away from Ryan's glare, laughing as he raised his hands to ward off incoming retribution. "It'll help sell the poor abused victim thing."

Gary spoke up before Ryan settled on the most efficient way to exact revenge, given that apparently he was supposed to be making the most important call of his life right now.

"Don't worry dude," he said, his interruption soothing the tension holding the rest of the room hostage. "I'll kick his ass for you."

Ryan kept his glare trained on Eddie awhile longer, weighing the offer. Mind readers were really good at vengeance. He gusted his breath out in an annoyed sigh, shook his head and slung his backpack over his shoulder.

"Whatever," he grunted, throwing an arm out towards Gary as he headed towards the door again. "See, this is why he's my favorite."

He just didn't have the energy for anything more hardcore than that at the moment. There'd be plenty of opportunities to pay Eddie back in the future. It wasn't like he was going to stop being an asshole anytime soon.

Sides, they had a point. A bruised face was probably exactly what would seal the deal with Cohen.

Ugh. Fuck his life.

A/N Part Two: Gonna try not to have author's notes on every chapter and let the story speak for itself, but since this story is so different from most OC stories I just wanted to clarify some initial things. Ryan's past and his reasons for doing all this are going to be unveiled throughout the next several chapters and I don't want to spoil too much, but I also don't want people to read too much into the assortment of characters chosen for this first part. Heather and Volchok and Eddie being part of this group with Ryan isn't meant to indicate that this is a bad crowd with a nefarious agenda and Ryan's going to be 'redeemed' by the Cohens and friends showing him a better way…I'm aiming for a much more shades of gray story. Those characters being part of this group with Ryan is a matter of it being a mixed bag of individuals united by common history and purpose, not necessarily because they all have the same ideals or same longterm agendas or because they even like each other. Ryan isn't going to be redeemed by the Cohens because he doesn't need redeeming. He has his reasons for being with this group and doing what he's doing, they're not all good and they're not all bad, the same way pretty much all the characters native to Newport are a mix of both themselves.


End file.
